Chapter Twenty-Six
Over the next fortnight, Darcy found himself returning to Matlock House with a regularity that would, under other circumstances, have invited remark.
As it was, the visits of the Count of Vendicarsi were sufficiently desired within the ton that no one thought to question the frequency of his attentions.
Invitations were extended freely, and his presence was received with a mixture of curiosity and admiration that allowed him to come and go with ease.
It was not society that drew him there. Each call, each hour spent in Elizabeth’s company, seemed to restore some portion of himself that had long lain dormant.
What had begun in caution deepened with surprising rapidity into something steady and assured, the years of separation having distilled their attachment to its truest form rather than diminishing it.
There was no need for pretense between them now, no careful negotiation of feeling.
They understood one another with a clarity that rendered unnecessary the artifices of polite courtship.
They walked often in the gardens.
The early signs of spring had long since given way to fuller expression, the grounds of Matlock House growing more vivid with each passing day.
The hedges softened with new growth, the beds brightened with blossoms that opened one by one, and the air itself seemed to carry a warmth that had been absent only weeks before.
Elizabeth took pleasure in pointing out the smallest changes, noting the progress of each bloom like a shared triumph.
Darcy listened, sometimes with amusement, sometimes with attentiveness, but always with the sense that such moments held greater consequence than they might outwardly appear.
At certain junctures, their discourse extended considerably, encompassing topics of both trivial and profound nature, while at other times, a comfortable silence would prevail.
In those intervals, Darcy found himself observing her with a steadiness he did not attempt to disguise.
He noted the ease of her movements, the quick intelligence of her expression, the warmth that animated her features when she smiled.
There had been a time when he believed such observation a luxury forever denied him.
Now, it seemed almost unreal that he might indulge it so freely.
With each meeting, the burden he had carried for so long grew less oppressive.
It did not vanish. The past could not be so easily set aside, nor did he wish it to be.
There were still wrongs to be addressed, still truths to be brought to light.
The sharp edge of his resentment dulled in ways he had not anticipated.
The anger that had once sustained him no longer held the same power.
In its stead, a new, less engrossing and equally steadfast, phenomenon arose.
He thought of Hargrave and Langford often.
Their names did not provoke in him the same immediate fury as before.
Instead, they occupied a more distant place in his mind, as though the urgency of their downfall had been tempered by the knowledge that it was already in motion.
He did not seek out Richard for news, though the inclination remained.
He understood, now more clearly than ever, that such matters required patience.
Ships did not arrive at a man’s command, nor did the machinery of the law move with haste for any individual, however deserving.
To interfere would be to risk all that had been carefully arranged. So, he resisted.
Lucien, observing these changes, offered no direct comment, though his satisfaction was evident in the ease with which he moved about the house and in the occasional glance he cast toward Darcy when he thought himself unobserved.
He remained, as ever, a resolute presence, his counsel neither intrusive nor absent, but precisely suited to the moment.
“You are learning,” he said one evening, as they sat together in the smaller drawing room at Ashcombe House, a decanter of port between them.
Darcy raised a brow. “Am I? Learning what?”
“To live again,” Lucien replied.
Darcy did not answer at once. He turned the glass in his hand, watching the dark liquid catch the light. “Perhaps,” he said noncommittally.
Lucien smiled faintly and said no more.
Richard, too, became a frequent presence at Matlock House, though his attentions were divided between his family and the constant vigilance he maintained over Darcy’s situation.
There was an understanding between them now that required little expression.
Where once there had been questions and doubt, there was now a shared purpose, tempered by an awareness of the limits of what each could control.
Elizabeth, in her own manner, proved no less constant.
She spoke openly of her concerns, though never in a way that suggested mistrust. Rather, she approached the subject of his past with a careful balance of sympathy and practicality, appearing determined to understand fully without allowing herself to be overwhelmed by it.
It was during one such walk that she spoke of Darcy House. “I have called there twice more,” she said, as they moved along a path bordered by low hedges just beginning to fill with green.
Darcy turned his attention fully to her. “And?”
“She continues to receive me kindly,” Elizabeth replied. “Your sister, I mean.”
A faint tension passed through him at the mention.
“She appears well,” Elizabeth told him. “Content, even. There is something—”
She paused, considering her words.
“It is in the way she defers. It is not entirely natural.”
Darcy’s expression grew more intent. “Mrs. Younge?”
“Yes.”
Elizabeth’s brows drew together.
“She is always present. Always attentive. It is not the attention of a servant, nor even of a companion.”
She hesitated.
“It feels more controlling.”
Darcy exhaled slowly. “That does not surprise me.”
Elizabeth glanced at him. “You know her better than I.”
“I know enough,” he said. They walked a few steps in silence before he added, “She is Hargrave’s sister.”
Elizabeth stopped. “What?”
Darcy turned to face her. “It is true. The connection was not immediately apparent, but it has been confirmed.”
Elizabeth’s expression shifted from surprise to concern. “Then her influence is not merely personal.”
“No.”
She resumed walking, though her pace was slower now, her thoughts clearly engaged. “That explains much,” she said. “Her manner, her authority. I had thought it unusual that she should act so freely, as though answerable to no one.”
Darcy’s mouth tightened. “She answers to him.”
Elizabeth did not respond for a breath. “And what do you intend to do?” she asked.
Darcy considered the question.
“Beyond ensuring she is brought to account for her part in this,” he said, “I do not know.”
Elizabeth looked at him steadily.
“She has had too great an influence over Georgiana.”
“I am aware.”
The calmness of his response surprised her.
“But you hesitate.”
He met her gaze. “Not from lack of resolve. From uncertainty as to what will best serve my sister in the end.”
Elizabeth’s expression eased. “That is no small consideration.”
They walked on, the path curving gently toward a more secluded portion of the garden where the sounds of the house faded almost entirely. The air was warmer here, sheltered from the wind, and the faint scent of blossoms carried on the breeze.
Elizabeth spoke again, more quietly this time. “She loves him,” she said.
Darcy’s expression did not change, though he understood at once to whom she referred.
“I do not doubt it,” he replied.
“And he—” she hesitated. “He is not what I expected.”
Darcy glanced at her. “In what way?”
“There is an unsettled nature about him,” she said. “A sense that he is not at ease with himself. It is not merely dissipation. It is…regret. It is as you said.”
Darcy considered his answer. “That is possible,” he said at last. “Though it does not erase what has been done.”
“No,” Elizabeth agreed. “But it may alter what should be done in return.”
He did not answer. They walked on, the silence between them once more companionable, though touched now with the weight of shared consideration.
As the days passed, Darcy found that such conversations did not provoke in him the same resistance they once might have done.
Where he had previously guarded his intentions with care, he now allowed them to be examined, to be questioned, even to be challenged.
It was not that he had relinquished his purpose, but that it no longer stood alone as the defining force of his life.
Elizabeth had altered that. So had time.
He found himself thinking, more often than before, of what might come after.
The idea, once distant and uncertain, began to take shape with increasing clarity.
A life not governed by past wrongs, but by present choice.
A future in which his name might be reclaimed without bitterness, his estate restored without resentment, his affections given freely without fear of loss.
He did not know how such a future would be secured. But he believed, now, that it was possible.
One evening, as he stood at the window of Ashcombe House, looking out upon the square, he allowed himself to consider it more fully than he had dared before.
The past remained. It always would. It no longer held him with the same unyielding force.
He turned from the window, his thoughts settling into a calm he had not known in years.
Soon, he thought, the last of it will be resolved.
And when it was, he would be free—not only in name, but in truth—to leave it behind.
Darcy had not intended to seek Wickham that evening.